Chuck Schumer Backs Minnesota Liberal for Democratic Party Chairman

WASHINGTON — After his party’s brutal Election Day loss, Senator Chuck Schumer, the presumptive incoming Democratic minority leader, threw his support on Friday behind a liberal member of Congress to be the next chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Mr. Schumer’s choice, Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, is a favorite of the party’s left. Should he win the chairmanship, he would become one of the Democrats’ most visible spokesmen as the party seeks to regroup after losing the White House and an array of state-level offices to a populist wave fueled by white working-class voters.

The move signals the desire of Mr. Schumer to score early points with Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont, leaders from the party’s left. Mr. Schumer is likely to have to disappoint them at times in legislative battles after President-elect Donald J. Trump takes office as he seeks to protect endangered Democrats from Republican-leaning states who are up for re-election in 2018.

But Mr. Ellison, should he decide to run, will face some competition from Democrats who believe that the chairmanship should be a full-time job, not one that is split with the duties of being an elected official. Some Democrats also say they feel that the party should be run by someone who hails from an industrial state where the party has lost voters and support.

Others who are interested in the job include a former chairman, Howard Dean, a former governor of Vermont; Martin O’Malley, a former governor of Maryland; Raymond Buckley, the chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party; and Jaime R. Harrison, the chairman of the South Carolina Democratic Party.

“We have to do a better job of talking about not just equal rights for blacks and Latinos, but everybody,” Mr. Harrison said. “It doesn’t matter if you are a white person in West Virginia or a black person in South Carolina or New York City, we are fighting for each and every one of you.”

President Obama largely ignored the organization, charged with building the party’s foundation and electing Democrats to office, in favor of his own political group, Organizing for Action. The Democratic National Committee has been run since this summer by Donna Brazile after the previous leader, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, stepped down after the leak of committee emails that portrayed her in an unflattering light.

“The infrastructure of the party is in shambles,” said Mo Elleithee, a Democratic strategist. “You need someone who is going to really roll up their sleeves and figure that piece out.”

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Representative Keith Ellison in October in New York. Mr. Schumer is backing Mr. Ellison to be the next chairman of the Democratic National Committee.CreditIlya S. Savenok/Getty Images

Mr. Ellison, 53, has served in the House since 2007, representing greater Minneapolis. An African-American Muslim and the leader of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, he was an early supporter of Mr. Sanders and was among a relative handful of Democrats who took Mr. Trump’s prospects as a presidential candidate seriously from the beginning.

The central challenges for the next party chairman, Democrats say, include rebuilding the party’s ailing infrastructure and finding a way to excite voters. Of particular interest are those who backed Mr. Obama but did not support Hillary Clinton, and white working-class voters who have drifted to the Republicans.

“Without a Democratic White House, Schumer’s view is the D.N.C. is where grass-roots organizing in sync with legislative battles should be organized,” said Matt House, a spokesman for Mr. Schumer.

But Democrats may also find themselves in an ideological tangle that has knotted up both parties for the past several years. Progressives like Mr. Sanders, Ms. Warren and Mr. Ellison could be at odds with more moderate Democrats, including a large number who face tough re-election fights in 2018 in the Senate.

“I really, really like Keith,” Ms. Warren said this week on MSNBC, speaking about Mr. Ellison. “And I think he’s terrific, and I think he would make a terrific D.N.C. chair.”

The chairman’s role is traditionally focused less on defining the party’s ideological stance than on fund-raising, providing the party with the technology and other tools it needs to be competitive and organizing at the grass-roots level.

“The worst thing the party can do is have a big fight over whether the chairman should be a progressive or moderate,” Mr. Elleithee said. “We don’t live on that paradigm anymore, and this election proved it.”

Mr. O’Malley said he was considering seeking the job because “our party needs to rebuild.”

“We need to acknowledge that our message did not communicate credibly enough for a large number of Americans, and we need to do it urgently in a collaborative and inclusive way,” he said. “This is not what I expected to be doing. Given my background as well as my experience traveling the country, there are people who have called me and told me I should run.”

Mr. Dean, who has said he is “very interested” in the job, employed a so-called 50-state strategy when he was chairman in 2005, working to recruit in places Democrats have often failed to flourish. He said this week that his strategy ought to be employed again.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A12 of the New York edition with the headline: Schumer Backs Minnesota Liberal as Next Democratic Party Chairman. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe